HOWTO: Install Local R Packages

This document shows you the steps to install R packages locally without root access on OSC's Oakley cluster.

R comes with a single library $R_HOME/library which contains the standard and recommended packages. This is usually in a system location. On Oakley cluster, it is /usr/local/R/3.0.1/lib64/R/library. R also has a default value for a directory where users can install their own R packages. On Oakley cluster, it is ~/R/x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu-library/3.0 if the default R-3.0.1 module is loaded. This directory doesn't exist by default. The first time a user installs an R package, R will ask the user if s/he wants to use the default location and if yes, will create the directory.

A Simple Example

First you need to load the module for R:

module load R

On Oakley, the default R module is version 3.0.1.

Then fire up an R session:

R

To install package lattice, use this command inside R:

> install.packages("lattice", repos="http://cran.r-project.org")

It gives a warning:

Warning in install.packages("lattice") :
'lib = "/usr/local/R/3.0.1/lib64/R/library"' is not writable
Would you like to create a personal library
~/R/x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu-library/3.0
to install packages into? (y/n)

Answer y, and it will create the directory and install the package there.

Setting the Local R Library Path

If you want to use another location rather than the default location, for example, ~/local/R_libs/, you need to create the directory first:

It is a bit of burden having to type the long string of library path every time. To avoid doing that, you can create a file .Renviron in your home directory, and add the following line to the file:

export R_LIBS=~/local/R_libs/

Whenever R is started, the directory ~/local/R_libs/ is added to the list of places to look for R packages and so:

> install.packages("lattice", repos="http://cran.r-project.org")

will have the same effect as the previous install.packages() command.

To see the directories where R searches for libraries, use the command:

>.libPaths();

Setting The Repository

When you install an R package, you are asked which repository R should use. To set the repository and avoid having to specify this at every package install, create a file .Rprofile in your home directory. This is the start up code for R. Add the following line to the file:

cat(".Rprofile: Setting R repository:")
repo = getOption("repos")
# set up the server from which you will download the package.
repo["CRAN"] = "http://cran.case.edu"
options(repos = repo)
rm(repo)

Now you only need to do

> install.packages("lattice")

That will download the package lattice from http://cran.case.edu and install it in ~/local/R_libs .

Updating Packages

> update.packages() inside an R session is the simplest way to ensure that all the packages in your local R library are up to date. It downloads the list of available packages and their current versions, compares it with those installed and offers to fetch and install any that have later versions on the repositories.

Removing packages

> remove.packages("lattice") inside an R session to remove package lattice. An even easier way is just to go into the directory ~/local/R_libs and remove the directory lattice from there.